


And Now (I'm Addicted to You)

by xxdrarryrebellexx



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Addiction, Angst and Humor, Angst with a Happy Ending, Depressed Draco Malfoy, Depressed Harry Potter, Drama, Drarry, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Romance, Flirting, Fluff and Angst, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Harry Potter Has PTSD, Harry Potter Has a Saving People Thing, Harry Potter Post-War, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Post-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, References to Depression, Romance, Sassy Harry Potter, These Boys Are My Emotional Support Characters, Tired Draco Malfoy, and what about it, i love drarry, potion addiction, this is going to be a RIDE, you're going to suffer but you're going to be happy about it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:01:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26762497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xxdrarryrebellexx/pseuds/xxdrarryrebellexx
Summary: Draco Malfoy is tired and angry. He's tired of being angry. Angry that he's so tired. He just wants to bloody sleep without seeing so much blood. He lets himself fall into the pit of dark nothing that the potion calls sleep."What are you doing here, Potter? And don't give me some non-answer.""Draco Malfoy," Harry starts, holding up his Ministry ID, "I've been assigned as your Sober Companion."
Relationships: Draco Malfoy & Blaise Zabini, Draco Malfoy & Harry Potter, Draco Malfoy & Pansy Parkinson, Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Harry Potter & Blaise Zabini, Hermione Granger & Harry Potter & Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger & Pansy Parkinson
Comments: 15
Kudos: 91





	1. :: prologue ::

**Author's Note:**

> [ _i hope this story is indicative of the fact that even if you're going through something, you're still deserving of love and that there are people out there that understand you and what you're going through_ ]

**:: sleep ::**

_ Cold. _

_ Dark. _

_ Empty. _

_ Silent. _

_ Then the screaming starts. _

His eyes blink open blearily as he sits up and reaches over to the side table for his last dose of Dreamless Sleep potion. The mind healer had given it to him a few days ago. It’s supposed to last for...he checks the label, 90 days.

He unplugs the stopper and brings the vial to his lips, chugging down the contents and lapping at the last few drops of the potion. He just wants to sleep. He wants one night of no nightmares. Of no pain. Of  _ nothing.  _ Seven years ago he’d almost been burnt alive by one of his best friends and he hasn’t slept properly since.

Draco Malfoy is tired and angry. He’s tired of being angry. Angry that he’s so tired. He just wants to bloody sleep without seeing so much blood. His body feels unnaturally heavy as he leans back onto his pillow and lets himself fall back into the pit of  _ cold, dark, empty, nothing, _ that the potion considers sleep.

He doesn’t quite know if he’ll wake up. He figures it’s for the best.


	2. :: Chapter 1 ::

“Malfoy?” asks Harry astonished, glancing between his boss and the Minister for Magic. “You want me to be _Draco Malfoy_ ’s sober companion? He’d hex me on sight.”

“We have it on good authority that Draco Malfoy doesn’t have a wand in his possession,” Minister Shacklebolt deflects with a shrug. “Just until we know he’s mentally stable enough to wield one again.”

“And besides,” adds Counselor Issac, the head of the Potions Safety and Rehabilitation department where Harry’s job resides, with his usual upbeat tone, “as his companion, you need to be sure he doesn’t do that. You’re there to _help_.” As if that would stop Malfoy from trying to run him through with an ice pick or something as equally mundane yet horrifying. Harry would laugh if he doesn't feel just as equally distraught by the news.

“He doesn’t have a wand?” Harry asks, his brows furrowed as he turns an eye back to Kingsley.

“His was confiscated after an anonymous friend of his reported him to your division,” Shacklebolt answers.

“But he’s head of his house, yeah? What about the Manor’s wand?”

Shacklebolt lifts a shoulder in an imitation of a shrug. “Also being kept under strict surveillance.” 

Harry narrows his eyes, an uneasy feeling creeping into his chest. “Where’s his mother?”

“Dead.”

The news felt like a slap to the face. Narcissa Malfoy had been inviting him over for years for a cup of tea as an apology or a favor, who knew, but he’d been strung out on potions just after the war and had kindly declined every letter post his addiction. The thought of being back in the manor had dredged up memories he wasn’t ready to face without a potion or someone to hold him away from one. When the owls finally stopped coming he’d assumed she had just gotten tired of asking not that she’d…

“Do we know if he was on potions before her… when she was alive?” His voice is quiet as he finally flips through the folder they had laid on his desk.

“Hard to say, but as you can see,” starts Issac as he reaches over Harry’s shoulder to point at a few notes posted inside the folder, “the report was made because he was found unresponsive in his bedroom in Wiltshire about 2 weeks ago.”

“So shouldn’t that have gone to—” Harry begins.

“And again a few days ago.”

“Someone at Mungo’s should have—”

“And again this morning.” This time Head Counselor Issac doesn't let his face break out into that creepy _too-much-Pepper-Up_ grin that reminds Harry awfully like Umbridge. No, the look he sends Harry is serious and painful and pleading. “Not everyone has friends like you do, Harry, and even if they do not everyone listens to their friends. I’ve gotten fourteen owls in the last few hours asking if I’ve found someone to help yet and I think you’d be the best man for the job.”

“We have a history. I’ll only make things worse.”

“Sometimes feeling s _omething_ is better than not feeling _anything_ , Harry. Don’t you remember?”

Harry freezes at that because it’d be hard to forget. All he’d done before was float through life with a steady rotation of Pepper-Up and Dreamless Sleep and whatever quick brew version he could get from seedy witches and wizards tucked away down Knockturn. He opens his mouth but before he can force out a sound other than a surprised _guh_ , Shacklebolt is shooting him a teasing grin.

“Besides, you saved his life before right? It was all you could talk about during _your_ recovery, if I remember correctly. Don’t let’em throw your efforts away.”

“That’d be just like Malfoy too, wouldn’t it,” Harry agrees with a huff of breath and a shake of his head.

Kinglsey smiles in Issac’s direction when the man looks as though he isn’t following. He leans a little closer and whispers into his ear while Harry opens the folder wider, leaving it flat on his desk and starts making his own notes about Malfoy within the margins.

“They were somewhat… sports rivals in school. Slytherin and Gryffindor. Both seekers for their house team then they ended up on opposite sides of the war. They parted on a somewhat amicable note. Harry spoke for him at the trials, but Minister in Training Granger says they’ve always had a bit of an obsession with each other. Malfoy was one of his sobering tokens, in a way. The idea of him kept Harry here from wavering. It’s why I told you he’d be the best for the job.” He nudges an elbow into the younger man’s side. “You’ll see.”

“After years of hearing people whisper about me, it's pretty easy to pick up on, Minister,” says Harry without looking up from his notes. 

“Just explaining to Head Counselor Issac the... _intricate_ history that you and Draco Malfoy share.”

Harry chokes out a laugh before shaking his head. “Nothing really to know and if there were, I'm sure none of it would pertain to the case.” He glances up at them and motions at his desk before going back to scribbling between the margins. “Now, if you don't mind I have a few more notes to make before I conduct my initial check-in.”

“Oh, yes, of course,” Shacklebolt agrees with a smirk and a wink in Isaac's direction. “We’ll leave you to it.” He nods while walking towards his office, chuckling as Issac follows him looking both intrigued and confused.

“We’re counting on you, Mr. Potter.”

Harry doesn't answer directly but he can't stop himself from muttering just loud enough for them to hear something that sounded an awful lot like “ _Aren't you always_.”

* * *

Malfoy Manor feels nothing like Harry remembers it. Though it’s still dark and gloomy it doesn’t feel half as dreadful. No flowers are blooming, but there seems to be the scent of roses lingering in the air as a lone white peacock roams the yard. The gate has been blasted open and left to hang by its hinges but the animal makes no move to escape. Harry wonders how much of the dank and dreary atmosphere is a byproduct of dark magic and curses that had been slung around by Voldemort and his followers. When he makes it to the door he reaches up and grips the thick brass knocker, but before he can bring it down to the wood, the door is pulled away from him.

Draco Malfoy looks worse than Malfoy Manor.

Harry doesn’t know what he expects when the man was found unresponsive just hours ago, but, it wasn’t this. This man is a shell of himself, a skeleton with long white hair greasy and matted to his scalp. He wears dark green house-robes and slippers that make him look even more pale and fragile as if a touch would turn him to dust. Somewhere in the back of Harry’s mind, he’d hoped that Malfoy was still that sharp-witted git with sharper limps. A part of him had believed that the continual close calls were accidents of decadence, not negligence. It’s hard to keep hold of that belief with the evidence staring at him across the threshold of a house he swore he’d never cross again.

“Of course they’d send you,” is all Malfoy says before he turns away from the door and hobbles inside. His voice sounds scratchy and just as hollow as the rest of him.

 _Potion burn_ , Harry thinks and remembers the feeling of tearing his throat apart with potions made of ingredients that were never meant to be ingested in such bulk, if at all.

“Here to arrest me? I’ve done nothing illegal. Going to take my wand? I don’t have one. Finally here to answer Mother’s letters?” Malfoy turns slightly, a single eye on Harry, the whites red and raw, before turning back in the direction he’s walking. “She’s dead.”

Harry's mouth almost drops at the sound of it being said again. Then his eyes move over the broken-down house overshadowed by its broken down owner and the implications that Malfoy is here in this big house alone. He thinks he understands the feeling of wanting to just let go, he's had it more than a few times.

Malfoy's leading Harry around his home with precision learned from years of playing in the hall, not for any particular rhyme or reason. He's almost positive they've passed the same portrait 3 times. 

“Why’re you really here, Potter?”

“The truth?”

“No, I’m asking so that you’ll _lie_ to me.”

“Well,” Harry starts, looking at the war-torn wallpaper, “the truth is you've been found unresponsive too many times and someone in your life is worried about you.”

“I wish they wouldn't be.”

“Being found unresponsive once is already too many times, really.”

“Maybe I don't want to be found.”

“Yeah, then maybe you should go somewhere without a busted front gate and shredded wards.” Harry shrugs. He and Malfoy aren't friends— have never been friends —and something about that type of relationship means they've never really needed to lie to each other.

Malfoy stops and turns to eye him angrily as if he's too much of an idiot to put it together. “Maybe I'm trying to kill myself,” he tries, making eye contact, but Harry merely shrugs again.

“Point still stands, yeah?”

Malfoy turns on the spot angrily and starts walking again, this time he’s moving with more of a purpose and Harry follows him at a more leisurely pace. Though his surroundings still put him on the edge, this thing with Malfoy is familiar. They're like memories from almost a decade ago that had helped him through his own demons and if the slight color returning to Malfoy's cheeks is an answer enough, he might be on the right track. His smirk feels well earned.

“So, is your dad set to come back once he's been released?” asks Harry, mostly to fill the silence while catching up to the skeletal man ahead of him.

“Father's coming home?” Malfoy responds, but it sounds empty again. _Going through the motions_ , Harry notes in his head.

“Uh…” is the best reply he can come up with. “I mean, yeah? They said he would be let out in another couple of months. Thought you would know.”

“Thought that's what triggered me.”

“No. Hadn't even thought of that.” And a part of him is beating himself up for _not_ thinking that and avoiding the topic altogether.

“So what else?” Malfoy finally snaps, stopping in his tracks and sending Harry stumbling into his back. The thin man oddly enough is well enough to catch himself before Harry has the chance. “Perfect Potter here to babysit me?”

“Sure. I guess you could see it that way.”

“What other way is there to see it?”

“Free company.”

“Are you trying to make the potions come back up? If so, I assure you they do not work the same way as too much Ogden’s.”

“You'd be surprised what rotten curry can do to an ingested Dreamless Sleep. In and out of sleep.”

“Potter you're about a second from me breaking your nose again.”

“Not in your condition,” says Harry through a chuckle.

“What are you _do_ _ing_ here, Potter? And don't give me some non-answer.”

“Draco Malfoy,” Harry starts, holding up his Ministry ID, “I've been assigned as your Sober Companion.”

There are almost a million reactions Harry has expected and even prepared for. Not one of them is Malfoy laughing himself to tears.

* * *

Harry makes himself as comfortable as possible [read not very] in the room that Malfoy insists on. They haven’t said a word since the blond had stopped laughing, and now that they’re both fully aware of the situation they’re in, there is nothing to say.

Malfoy has tried to convince Harry to just leave, but something about the hazy look in his eyes forces him to stay. Malfoy thinks he’s too stubborn for his own good and he has to admit that that _is_ a contributing factor.

“What if you leave me alone and I promise I won’t touch a single drop?”

“Ha,” says Harry humorlessly, “do you think I’m an idiot? Wait, don’t answer that. Better question: d’you think I’m going to actually fall for that?”

“Even I can hope.” Malfoy huffs a breath and rolls his eyes as if it didn’t really matter, but he can feel the tension rolling into the room as the need for a Pepper-Up rises to the forefront of Malfoy’s mind. He looks at Harry skeptically before standing up proudly and stumbling slightly on his way to the door. “A—”

“Accio Pepper-Up.” Harry’s voice is firm and Malfoy freezes. When he looks at Harry, he is still sitting seemingly unbothered while he listens to the vial buzzing as it zooms through the air and into his outstretched palm. He pulls it in closer to himself and looks at it for a moment, checking the label. A part of him recognizes the name of the potion master, a bastard of a man who runs an apothecary down on Knockturn. “Here you are, then.”

He holds it out to Malfoy. Keeping it in his own hand felt more dangerous than he’d expected after being clean for this long. Malfoy’s hand shakes as he wraps it around the glass between them, his fingertips cool where they touch Harry’s skin.

“What’s the catch?” he asks, though his grip is still tight around both the potion and Harry as if nothing he says could dissuade him now that it’s in his reach.

“No catch. The plan long term is to wean you off slowly until you’re clean, but for today, I’m just here to observe.”

“What,” orders Malfoy, “as if I’m a bloody potions experiment?”

Harry shrugs a shoulder. “Yeah, I s’pose.”

“Merlin’s bollocks,” Malfoy says, finally yanking the vial free from Harry’s hold. He tugs the cork out with his teeth, the release making a satisfying _pop_ , before tilting his head back and downing the viscous fluid in a couple of gulps. After a second or two, the tension eases from his shoulders. He lifts a single eyelid slowly like he wants to check to see if Harry is still there, even if he believes it’s all a bad dream. When Harry doesn’t disperse into dust and blow away into thin air, Malfoy looks down at the bottle as if it’s forsaken him, but takes his seat on the chaise again. “Fine. I’ll be your entertainment today if that’s what it takes.”


	3. :: Chapter 2 ::

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :: **trigger⚠️warning for past potion abuse and a brief mention of a past suicide attempt** ::

_ “Harry?” Hermione stood in the doorstep, clearly surprised to see him standing on her porch. She took one look at him before glancing down at the baby in her arms and opening the door wider. “Com— no just… just stay here.” It was an order and a plea all at once. Harry was too strung out on Pepper-Up to even breathe properly let alone notice the signs of worry in her voice, but he plopped into a crisscrossed sitting position on the other side of the doorframe anyway. She looked weary but went to lay the sleeping baby down. Ron was there looking at Harry the moment she stepped away. _

_ “Mate...uh, what’re you doin’ down there?”  _

_ “‘Mione tol’ me not’a go’nywhere. Don’t ‘ave anywhere to go.” _

_ “What d’you mean you’ve nowhere to go?” Ron asked as he helped Harry up and led him into the house, an arm around his torso to help keep him upright. _

_ “Grimmauld’s gone,” he said, voice certain as Ron eased him onto the couch and he slid himself onto the floor, one hand running across their rug and tugging at loose fibers. His clothes were torn and he was covered in soot almost exclusively. _

_ “It’s what?!” Hermione’s enraged whisper called from the corridor as she closed the door behind her that led to baby Hugo’s nursery. _

_ “It’s gone,” he said again as if she had just misheard him. “Sent Kreacher to Hogwarts and set it on fire. The magic protects the muggles though. The neighbors,” he clarified. _

_ “You set…” Ron began, flopping into one of the armchairs next to the fireplace a hand in his hair. _

_ “Harry James Potter!” Hermione’s voice was shrill, confused, and terrifying enough for him to blink up at her from his seat on the floor. They looked glassy as he rolled a dazed look in her direction, his eyes rolling to one side slowly like weighted golf balls. It was eerily silent as he blinked over at her again, a tear rolling down his soot-covered cheek. _

_ “I hadn’t gone to bed yet,” he said, his voice quiet as he stared at her. He couldn’t blink, but there was still that sick dopey potion grin on his face. “The spell went off too early.” _

_ Hermione and Ron both sucked in a breath. They all sat there in silence, no one daring to move. Then the potion finally gave and Harry fell forward onto the floor in a fit of sobs. _

* * *

“Mr. Potter!” calls a voice behind Harry, but he’s got a solid stride going towards his desk and he doesn’t want to slow down enough to see anyone else. After a night of memories and nightmares, he’s on edge and he needs a cup of coffee and something to focus on that isn’t the thrum he can still feel under his skin calling for a Pepper-Up even after being clean for 3 years.

“If you have something important to say, Counselor Issac, just say it. Otherwise, can it wait until  _ after  _ I’ve sat down and had a cup of coffee?” says Harry still moving purposefully towards his desk.

“That’s the problem, Harry. They found him unresponsive again this morning.”

Harry imagines it would be funny how quickly he stops and turns to look Issac in the eye if it were about anything else. He narrows his eyes at his boss before walking forward and forcing the papers and folders he had in his hands into the other man's chest. He storms back towards the elevators, slamming his finger on the button and crossing his arms as the mechanics around him whir. He doesn’t know if the machine is shooting him through the building slower than usual or if the idea of Malfoy being found unresponsive so soon after he last saw him has him anxious and ready to do something.

When the elevator lets him out into the foyer at the Ministry, he makes it across to the first floo he can see in seconds.

“Malfoy Manor!” Harry shouts, but not even he recognizes the sheer  _ panic _ in his own voice.

He’s spit out in a drawing-room he doesn’t recognize, which doesn’t give him much to go on considering he doesn’t know many rooms in the Manor. He dusts himself off and heads towards where he hears the most commotion coming from. As he walks down the corridors, he passes more than a few covered or destroyed portraits and stares at scorch marks on the wall that radiate dark magic. By the time he reaches the room where he figures Malfoy is, the floo goes off again.

“Draco, you  _ prat, _ ” says a woman’s voice.

“Pansy,” Malfoy says, his voice even weaker than it was yesterday, “Can we not do this right now? I don’t have the energy to open my eyes, let alone argue with you.”

“You think I care what you have the energy for right now when you—”

“Go home, Pansy.”

“Just so I can come back to your body lying somewhere else this time? No thank you.”

“Why can’t you take a hint? It’s not even a hint at this point. I don’t want you to be here. I just want to be alone right now.”

“You  _ shouldn’t  _ be alone right now.”

“For fucks sake—”

“I’ll take it from here, Parkinson,” Harry says walking into the room and leaning against the door jamb. Pansy Parkinson looks almost exactly as he remembered. She has intense eyes, a pig-like nose, and shoulder-length shiny black hair. She is a lot slimmer than when they were in school and accentuated that with a form-fitting little black dress, a green dragon skin bag draped across one shoulder.

“And what the hell is  _ he  _ doing here? Too weak to look at your best friend but not too weak to get pegged by Potter, is that it?”

“You sent him here, you hag.”

“I think I would remember sending the bloody saviour of the wizarding world to your house.”

“I’m his sober companion,” Harry explains. “Guessing you’re the one who called for help?”

“Well obviously!”

“He’s grateful.”

“Merlin’s ass if I am!” Draco interjects from his place on the chaise where it seems he really is too weak to sit up or keep his eyes open for longer than a second.

“He won’t say it,” Harry allows, “but he is.”

“Potter, stop talking.”

“He’s lucky to have someone who’s there for him like you are.”

“Can you even hear under all that presumption,” Malfoy tries again, “I’m honestly curious.”

“It’s hard for a lot of people to see loved ones like that, let alone calling someone else to see them like that.”

“Potter!” Malfoy is sitting up now, his cheeks red and his hair like a messy platinum halo around his head. Harry wants to smirk because he's done it. He got Malfoy up and angry and it's not  _ great,  _ but it's also not him pouting on some fancy couch in this ghost town of a house so Harry counts it as a win.

“Malfoy?”

“Be a dear,” he starts with a fake smile before snarling: “and shut your sodding mouth!”

Parkinson looks between them and Harry isn’t sure what she sees on Malfoy’s face, but whatever it is, it’s enough for her to nod solemnly and take her leave.

“I’ll leave you both to it then. Do invite me over for tea soon, Draco darling. Merlin knows Millie and I miss you loads.” She doesn’t wait for him to respond before she’s stepping back through the floo and disappearing in a blaze of green flames.

“Oh, great,” Malfoy groans, flopping back onto his seat just as dramatic as Harry remembers him being before the war. “Can’t imagine what she’s thinking now.”

“Wanted to be alone with me that badly?” Harry takes a seat in an armchair across from Malfoy and reaches for the tea service that’s sitting on the intricately carved coffee table. When he looks back over at Malfoy, the other man has sat up rigidly in his seat, his gaunt face red and pinched.

“I would rather have gone to Azkaban with father.”

“Well, the dementors wouldn’t have been there at least,” Harry says nodding, before continuing to fix his tea. He plops in a couple of sugar cubes and stirs it around before taking a cautious sip. He doesn’t think he’ll be poisoned, but he remembers back when he used to fill his teapots with potions so Hermione and Ron wouldn’t be suspicious. He sighs out, a bit more relaxed, once he swallows down what is luckily just Darjeeling.

“How long is this going to take?”

Harry glances up unbothered by Malfoy’s tone and shrugs. “As long as it takes for you to recover.”

“No, really. What do I have to do for you to leave me alone?”

He’s looking at Harry like it’s all a joke. A farce just to spite him set up by Parkinson or whoever else Mafoy’s hung out with since school has ended. Harry wants to say that not dying after he risked his life to save the git, would be  _ great _ , but he doesn’t, instead, he just shrugs again and goes back to chewing on one of the biscuits that he’d picked up from the tray. “You know, this’d be good with some _ — _ ”

“If I didn’t want Pansy here, then why do you think I would want to spend a second alone with  _ you _ ? And why in Merlin’s name would you tell her all of that nonsense about…” Malfoy stops with a shudder. He looks as if he’s going to be sick and Harry raises an eyebrow.

“About you being grateful?”

“Yes.  _ That _ .”

“Well, aren’t you?”

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Malfoy asks leaning forward as he stares Harry down. “Are you actually Potter or is this some kind of Polyjuice ruse?”

“I’m pretty sure I’m me, yeah. Not too sure about you, though.”

“Oh, yes, hilarious. I look like shite, I’m aware. What’s your excuse? Are you on potions as well?”

“Not for a few years now,” Harry says before taking another sip of tea. It’d been blasted over all the papers every year since he’d first gone sober. He would be surprised that Malfoy didn’t already know if he didn’t look like the husk of his old self. “So what do you do here all day. Other than..? You know.”

“ _ What _ ?”

“Like what sort of stuff _ — _ ”

“I heard what the bloody hell you said, I’m trying to make the first part make sense. You were on potions? For how long?”

“You have a lot of questions today.”

“But you’re...well, you’re  _ you. _ ” It’s like he hasn’t even heard the obvious change of subject and Harry feels like he’s itching beneath the skin. He grits his teeth, but it’s no help.

“Hadn’t realized that, thanks,” says Harry more viciously than he means to. “It’s been ages since someone’s reminded me of what a bloody perfect little hero I am. Or used to be. So thanks for that.”

“When were you  _ ever  _ perfect?” Malfoy argues, cutting him off, but his eyes are still wide while he’s looking at Harry as if he’s never seen him before. “I just mean to say, I thought you were too erumpent-headed to fall for the temptation, is all.”

Harry deflates at what he knows to be Malfoy turning down a challenge for maybe the first time ever. He glances down into the teacup. He wishes he would have listened in divination, and maybe then he would have seen this coming. Would have known how to stop from drinking himself into a hole he couldn’t get out of without Ron, Hermione, and Andromeda giving him an idea of consequences. “Yeah, so did I.”

“How’d you make you make yourself stop?” Malfoy’s voice is something like an awed whisper, though Harry would never say as much.

“I wasn’t allowed to see my god-kids. Why?” Harry smirks. “Are you considering it?”

Malfoy smirks back at him and it brings life back to his sickly face. “Just curious.”

Only now does Harry notice that Malfoy isn’t actively asking him to leave anymore and he supposes he should count that as a win too.


	4. :: Chapter 3 ::

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :: **trigger⚠️warning for a brief mention of vomiting just after the page break** ::   
> _SUPER BRIEF but thought i'd mention it just in case_

The next morning doesn't turn Harry's stomach the way he thought it might when he'd gone home the night before with memories of Malfoy that he could think of as being somewhat _fond_. He has quite a few memories of not hating Malfoy completely, but this feeling is new.

Harry makes it just outside the visitor's entrance to the Ministry when he is accosted by a handsome smirking man with well-kept locs and rich dark skin.

"Potter," he says like they're old friends even though Harry doubts as much. He looks familiar, at least. "We've got much to discuss."

"I'm sorry," Harry says looking the man up and down. He licks his lips, trying not to let a smirk work it's way onto his face as well. He's been told that his smile, however, is quite charming. "Do I know you?"

The man across from him raises an interested yet teasing brow. "You could."

"Well, what can I do for you?"

"Whatever you'd like."

The line forces a laugh from him even if Harry doesn't fully believe it, rewarding the man with a genuine smile almost twice as disarming as the press smile Harry's become known for. The man in front of him is dressed in muggle garb, a well-tailored suit in a classy olive green, but Harry can see the wand print where it's holstered beneath his sleeve. Somehow it doesn't put fear into him the way he supposes it should.

"It must be important or else you wouldn't be waiting outside my place of work. So, what'd you need to talk to me about?"

When the man says "Draco", everything clicks into place.

"If Malfoy sent you to run me off, Zabini, he's wasting your time." Harry starts walking, motioning for the admittedly gorgeous man that is Blaise Zabini to come along with him as he holds open the phone-booth door. After they're squeezed together in the tight space and Harry starts dialing the number, Zabini speaks again.

"I'm still surprised you decided to help."

"It's my job."

"But you didn't have to accept his case." Zabini shrugs his elegant shoulders then picks an invisible piece of lint from his jacket. "From what Pansy says, you seem to have everything under control."

"I wouldn't say that. It's barely been two days."

"Still," Zabini allows. "I came to thank you."

"A gift basket would have worked just as well."

"A gift basket isn't as charming. Besides, who says _I'm_ not your gift."

"Can't say I'm opposed to the offer. How'd you know I was weak for a pretty face?" Harry means it mostly as a joke, but he does give Zabini another once over as they walk through the Ministry lobby.

"A man can hope." He grins. Attractive yet feral. Like a predator that's caught his prey. Harry can't be bothered to feel put off by it. "At least you can admit I'm pretty."

"I'm not known for lying, Zabini."

"Call me Blaise."

"Harry."

* * *

Harry can admit that Blaise Zabini is a good lay. He has no one in particular that he wants to admit that particular bit of information _to_ because he knows the judging eyes that will be on him as if he's chosen a new way to dive headfirst into self-destruction, but if he _did_ have someone to admit it to, he would.

As it stands, Harry makes it to Malfoy Manor more than an hour later than he has the last couple of times. When he knocks on the door, Malfoy opens it with a terrified look in his wide eyes, but he doesn't look like he's all there.

"Y-you're _late,_ " he snaps as though Harry hadn't seen the time on the analog clock as he left the hotel after he and Blaise had finished.

"And _you're_ hammered to all hell. Can I come in?" Harry doesn't wait for an answer as he easily pushes past Malfoy and walks towards the last drawing-room he remembers being in. "So what were you doing before I got here?"

Malfoy doesn't make any move to answer him. When Harry glances over he sees that Malfoy hasn't made any moves at all since he'd come in the house. He watches while Malfoy fights to sink back into himself. The only thing that is still showing his continued existence is the quick blinking of his wide eyes and the panicked breaths wheezing through his lungs. Harry is fine to wait until Malfoy can at least breathe normally before he leads him to a bed or chaise as he comes down from what looks to be a terrifying high, but the other man's next few wheezes sound pitifully like _Potter_ and _please._ The sound of it is enough to set Harry in motion. It's Malfoy telling Harry that he doesn't really want to die, regardless of what he tells Parkinson or Blaise. It's a sign that, if only slightly, Malfoy has decided there's something left to _live_ for _._

He has a hand on Malfoy's back before he's even realized. He can feel the chill through the thin layer of silk and acts. It feels terrifying, like seeing dementors for the first time. Like watching your family be murdered and forced through a veil you can't follow. Like being late when someone's life is in your hands. There's a spell weaving its way through his lips immediately, claiming Malfoy's stomach to settle it, but it does nothing to set his own mind at ease. Within another second, there's the sound of gurgling and Malfoy upends everything in his stomach. It's not a pleasant sight to watch and Harry knows from experience it's even less pleasant to feel, but it forces everything up and out. Forces Malfoy back into himself even if he has to dry heave for several moments after the potions are up.

Malfoy stands feebly, stumbling away from Harry's touch. He tries to shoot him down with a glare, but it's such a pathetic attempt that Harry can feel the twinge of that _not-hatred_ that he feels towards Malfoy but has neglected to put a real name on yet.

Being Malfoy's sober companion isn't like the other jobs he has had where the client wants to be coddled and babied after a break. Malfoy doesn't open up. He shuts Harry out. He wants to be alone because Harry had left him alone for too long. One of the first things he learned when he started training under Head Counselor Issac was consistency. The idea that a client's life is unstable and in trying to impart control over it they've lost any control they had. That _he's_ the stability in their life now, in Malfoy's life, and he was willing to throw that away for an admittedly good lay.

"Bad night?" he hazards after standing in the corridor in silence for what feels as much like forever as it feels like a few breaths.

"Bad life," responds Malfoy, dry in his delivery. His voice still sounds like someone has attacked his throat with sandpaper, even more so now that he's had to experience the potions coming back up, but it's not wavering.

The conversation dies there but the silence is grating against Harry's nerves. It reminds him of nights alone in Grimmauld after he had his own bad nights and even worse hangovers in the mornings. Malfoy is determinedly not talking anymore. Not to start a conversation or to send Harry home or to ream him again for being late. It's like he's given up on Harry or at least the idea that Harry (or anybody else) will be there for him when he needs it. Harry thinks about the astronomy tower and the room of requirement and Malfoy being found unresponsive in the Manor and how he can save his life a thousand times over, but he can never be on time when Malfoy really needs him. Friends or not.

His tongue is weighed down by innumerable things that he wishes he could say, one of which is just _sorry_ , but when he opens his mouth, it doesn't come out. As he slowly approaches Malfoy with a hand on his back again, he doesn't actually know what he is saying, but whatever it is is enough to get them through the foyer and into what Harry guesses used to be a sunroom.

The house still feels dreary here, but it looks brighter. There are five glass walls that make up the room, the sixth connects it to the rest of the manor. The high glass ceiling is domed, letting beams of sunlight shine through in streaks where the windows panels are cracked and dirtied with grime. In the soft light of late morning, Malfoy looks alive. Here, he outshines the Manor.

Harry glances away, clearing his throat quite loudly before looking around for something to say. There are hand-made flower pots stacked on top of one another, but no plants brimming from them. There are a set of raised flower beds lining the perimeter of the room but most of them are creepily barren. Standing beneath the light of one of the south-facing walls, the only greenery in the space are Harry's eyes. He opens his mouth to ask about the emptiness when he notices that Malfoy has hobbled himself over to an ornate metal-work table positioned in the center of the floor and taken a seat. There's a partially eaten breakfast platter in front of him that he reaches an elegant hand out to, grabbing a piece of toast and sitting back into his seat. Harry snaps his mouth closed. He waits for Malfoy to take a few bites of his toast, waiting for him to have something in his stomach after forcing him to empty it so thoroughly, before coming closer.

Malfoy's eyes snap to the movement as soon as he takes a step. They look much less terrified, but they're still glazed, his pupils blown wide.

"I'm sorry," Harry manages to say and as he expects, Malfoy scoffs at him. What he doesn't expect is the silence that comes after. There's no piercing comment about how Malfoy didn't expect anything from him or how he should have known Harry was lying. It looks like Malfoy is fine with refusing to acknowledge him beyond his initial lack of response. "I didn't mean to be late. Something came up. I- It won't happen again." He wants to promise, but he doesn't think it'd mean much, all things considered.

"I'm a grown man, Potter," Malfoy says, rolling his eyes when Harry looks up to meet them. "Stop groveling."

He knows it's an olive branch. A way Malfoy is saying 'thank you for saving my life _again_ ' without having to say much of anything. Even so, there's still the uneasy feeling of emptiness between them that Harry realizes belatedly that he hates. Malfoy's silence eats away at him for some reason. He searches the room with his eyes to find something to talk about. _Anything_ to get Malfoy talking to him. It's not too long before his eyes finally catch sight of a patch of daffodils in a variety of colors in one of the raised flowerbeds.

"Those are beautiful." He stands again to get a closer look, but there's a protection spell surrounding the entire area where they reside. "Oh, are they important? What are they?"

"You're an idiot," says Malfoy before going back to eating his bland toast. He doesn't speak for the rest of the day. Doesn't even budge when Harry is close enough that he knows Malfoy can smell the coffee and half-chewed mint he'd had when leaving Blaise's hotel room. The blond barely pays him a glance. Harry has never liked being the center of attention, but not having Malfoy's focus on him is so unheard of that it seems like torture. He sits back down in the chair across from him and watches as Malfoy methodically picks at the toast and sips at his tea and doesn't say a word to Harry. He wonders why he ever thought it would be so easy.

Harry has known Draco Malfoy since he was 11 years old and though much can be said to describe the blond-haired Slytherin git, **_easy_** has never been one of them.


	5. :: Chapter 4 ::

It’s become a sort of game for Malfoy, Harry is sure. Just to see how far he can push him before he goes absolutely mental from the silence. After Harry’s tardy slip-up during his third day on Malfoy watch, the git hasn’t spoken a word to him. Harry would bet his fortune that Malfoy is refusing to talk just out of sheer principle. He’s trying his best to start conversations or arguments or anything that will get him to open his mouth to no avail.

“You know, I wonder what you do when I’m not here. Do you talk to the house elves and the portraits? Is it just me you’re ignoring?”

Malfoy doesn’t respond, though Harry doesn’t expect him to anymore. It’s been three days of silence, only the sound of his spoon clinking against the tea-cup is an interruption to the peace.

“I mean, I’d imagine it’d get kind of boring talking to yourself.” Harry sits up a bit straighter and forces out his best Malfoy impression. “ _ Some of us aren’t quite as simple-minded as you are, Potter _ .” He nods to himself. “Of course,  _ you’d  _ say that.”

Harry praises himself at the twitch of Malfoy’s left eye, but the blond is still resolutely silent. They sit in the quiet for almost an hour before Harry finally breaks the silence again.

“Today is your last day of observation,” he says, hiding a smirk when Malfoy finally looks up at him. “Tomorrow is officially your first day of recovery! No potions at all, unless prescribed by a Healer and of the recommended dosage.”

Harry only gets a huff and an eye-roll for his efforts, but he didn’t expect much more. He knows that Malfoy isn’t excited about this whole arrangement, but he’s not unwilling either. Harry can work with that.

“Parkinson was kind enough...well I don’t know if  _ kind _ would be the word exactly, but she didn’t put up too much of a fight when I asked for your schedule for tomorrow.”

“What?”

“Wow. D’you know that’s the first thing you’ve said to me in days?”

“Potter, what the fuck did you just say?”

“I asked Parkinson for a schedule of things that you typically do on Saturdays.”

“You  _ what _ ?” Malfoy says, his eyes finally meeting Harry’s, though he looks absolutely livid.

“Today is the last day of observation,” he says again. “That means I’m getting rid of all your potions and spending the night to make sure you don’t do anything stupid or dangerous. Then tomorrow morning, we’re going to follow whatever shoddy schedule Parkinson threw together to get you out of this blasted house.” He looks around the drawing-room they’re sitting in as if to provide emphasis. The curtains on the windows look as though they’ve been gnawed on by pixies, there’s a hole burned into the wallpaper next to the bookshelf, and anything not pushed together in the middle of the huge floor was covered in a thick layer of dust, as if the house-elves had only been directed to clean the parts of the room that were being used.

When Harry looks back at Malfoy, the blond is fuming. His mouth is gaped open, but no sound is coming out and his entire face has gone red. His left eye twitches again and he looks as though he wants to run Harry through with the sharpest object he can find. Luckily for Harry, they’re too far from any of them. He does, however, commend himself for knowing Malfoy so well when the man’s hand twitches as if he wants to throw a hex at him instead.

“You— you! Who the hell do you think you are!?” Malfoy finally forces out, standing up from his seat on the soft floral print armchair where he’d been flicking through the pages of a book in between sips of tea. “You can’t keep barging into my life doing and saying whatever the hell you like!”

“What life? All you do is lay about, throwing back potions like they’re water in a desert.”

“And you’d know  _ all  _ about that, would you?”

“Yeah, I would!”

“And how did that go for you?”

“Let me lay this out for you,” starts Harry firmly, ignoring the question. He is looking Malfoy directly in the eyes and though he is still seated, he knows he has the upper hand. “I’m not going anywhere until you’re better. You want to be rid of me? Follow the system. Until then,” Harry shrugs.

“How dare you? How fucking _dare_ _you_ sit there all high and mighty? As if you’re some perfect sodding god sent to save the rest of us! Some of us don’t get better!” Malfoy’s voice breaks and he looks like he hates himself all the more for it. “Ever thought of that, hm? Ever thought that maybe I need the potions? Maybe this is the best version of me left since the bloody war took everything else?”

“I don’t believe that,” Harry says softly. “You can get better. Malfoy, you  _ deserve  _ better. Don’t you get that? That’s why Parkinson keeps checking in on you. That’s why she owled us in the first place.”

“She owled the Ministry because she’s a nosy bint.”

“She owled the Ministry because she cares about you and she thinks you deserve better than dying from a potion overdose all alone in this dusty old fucking mansion.”

Malfoy takes one more look at Harry before turning and making his way towards the door. “I’m going to bed. You can have the rest of the biscuits.”

“Malfoy, we’re not done here!” Harry says, jumping from his seat as if to chase after him.

Malfoy pauses once he reaches the door, but he doesn’t turn back to face Harry. “I’ll have Sanby set up a room for you,” he says to the empty hallway, sounding resigned and miserable and something else that Harry can’t quite put his finger on. He’s gone hobbling off down the dark corridor before Harry can think of anything to say.

Harry spends the rest of the afternoon and evening alone. He takes slow steps through the Manor,  _ accio _ -ing any potions he can think of and asking the house elves to bring him the ones he can't. He vanishes the contents and leaves the array of bottles for Malfoy to see whenever he gets up. Harry thinks that maybe he needs to  _ see  _ the problem to acknowledge he has one.

Malfoy doesn't come down for dinner, and Harry can't say he had expected him to after their argument, but it still plucks at something in his chest unpleasantly.

* * *

Harry wakes up screaming from a nightmare that he can’t remember once he opens his eyes. There’s a hand on his shoulder that he doesn’t recognize. He doesn’t think before blasting out a wandless  _ stupefy _ and watches as Draco Malfoy gets blasted backward into a wall. Even still, it takes him a moment to completely understand what’s happening. When he does, he tosses the cover from himself, rushing over to check the damage. He kneels down next to Malfoy on the floor to check for any injuries.

“Merlin’s bollocks, Malfoy, you ‘bout scared  me all to hell . You alright?”

“Am I— No, I’m not alright! You poured out every last drop of potion I had in the entire Manor, woke me up with your blasted screaming, then you  _ stupified  _ me across the bloody fucking room!”

“Sorry ‘bout that. Though to be fair—”

“There’s nothing fair about any of this.”

“—you did kind of surprise me, grabbing me like that fresh out of a nightmare.” Harry stands once he’s sure that Malfoy is okay and looks around the room for a clock. When he doesn’t see one he hums in acknowledgment. “What time is it?”

“Too bloody early on a Saturday. I’m going back to bed.” Malfoy stands up, using the wall for support, and dusting himself off grandly, as if he is wearing anything more spectacular than a pair of sleeping trousers and a well-worn jumper that swallows his sickly thin frame. “Hopefully, when I wake up this will all be over.”

Harry goes over to the bed and grabs his wand from where he’d stuck it under his pillow the night before. He turns around, holding his wand up to cast a  _ tempus,  _ and watches as Malfoy flinches away from the sight of the wand so hard that he stumbles back onto the floor. Harry drops his wand as if it's burned him.

“I was just going to check the time.”

“You don’t have to point your bloody wand at me to do that,” says Malfoy angrily before picking himself off of the ground and storming out. “I’m going back to bed.”

“Malfoy! Wait—” Harry rushes from the room after him, grabbing his wrist just before the blond is able to run away or dive into a passageway only he’d know the way out of. “I’m sorry I—” Harry takes a deep breath. “I really was checking the time.”

“Just— Don’t let it happen again.”

He doesn’t stay to hear if Harry has anything else to say, he just tugs his arm free and stalks off down the hall, only stumbling slightly as he rounds a corner.

“ _ Oh, great job, Saint Potter _ ,” Harry sneers at himself in a pitchy imitation of Malfoy’s posh drawl as he walks somberly back into the room. “ _ Really know how to put a patient at ease _ .” He flops back onto the bed in his borrowed room and groans.

It takes around another hour for Harry to push himself from the bed and start getting dressed. As he bends over to finally retrieve his wand, he’s met with the tired yet perplexed voice of Draco Malfoy standing right behind him in the doorway.

“Is this supposed to be some kind of joke?”

Harry snatches his wand up and turns around, sticking it into his back pocket. He and Malfoy stand there staring at each other for what feels like an eternity before the blond rolls his eyes.

“Uh,” says Harry very intelligently.

“What’s first on Pansy’s agenda?” Malfoy asks instead once he assumes Harry is too mortified to speak. He starts walking down the hall, fully expecting Harry to follow him. “Strippers? Muggle shopping?”

“Brunch?” Harry offers, a few steps behind, though it sounds like more of a question even to him. “With her and Blaise.”

“Seven hells.”

“Does she usually offer to send you strippers first thing on a Saturday morning?”

“Only when I’m feeling particularly randy.”

Malfoy’s tone is dry and his face doesn’t veer from its usual sneer as he says it, but something about the way his brow twitches has Harry realizing it’s a joke. He snorts out a laugh and watches as some of the tension trickles from Malfoy’s shoulders before he stiffens up again. They’re headed to the sunroom again, the light making Malfoy’s pale hair glisten like a halo around his head even if his eyes still look sunken and tired.

“Wait. Did you say Blaise?”

“Yeah? What, the two of you get in a row or something?” There’s a teasing grin on Harry’s face when he says it, but Malfoy is still looking at him as if he has grown another head.

“ _ You  _ called him  _ Blaise _ .”

“That  _ is  _ his name.”

“Oh,” says Malfoy. Then more emphatically, “ _ Oh _ .”

“D’you mind telling me what the hell you’re on about?”

“You and Blaise.  _ Snogging _ .”

“I’m pretty sure snogging is one of the only things we  _ didn’t _ do,” Harry counters, twirling his wand between his fingers absently.

Malfoy chokes as if the thought had never even occurred to him. Harry steps closer to him, rubbing a hand up and down his back. Malfoy pulls away, balking at him.

“You can’t possibly be insinuating what I think y—”

Harry shrugs as he eases back into his stride and watches as Malfoy stares at him as if he’s seeing him for the first time.

“Is this…” Malfoy starts then pauses for a second as if he’s searching for the correct words to use. Harry is surprised to see the tips of his ears turn bright red as he clears his throat, his voice coming out much posher than Harry thinks is usual even for him. “Are the two of you a thing, then?”

“Who? Me and Blaise?” Harry barks a laugh once Malfoy nods stiffly. “No. It was only the one time. Said he was thanking me for taking care of you.”

“Of course he would say that. It’s  _ Blaise _ .” Malfoy freezes again before narrowing his eyes at Harry. Something about it feels both electric and terrifying all at once. The air smells crisp like fresh-picked apples and clean linen. Like magic. “So, how was it?”

It’s Harry’s turn to choke, but Malfoy doesn’t reach over to help. He only tilts his head to the side as if it’s his turn to observe the man before him. Harry turns away from the knowing stare but he can still feel the eyes on him as his cheeks get steadily warmer.

“Why?” he asks with a sense of false bravado. “Jealous?”

“Merlin, no. Just never would have guessed this was a usual occurrence for you.”

“Shagging Blaise?”

“Shagging men.”

“I don’t really have a preference.”

“Color me surprised.”

“That’s awfully small-minded of you,” says Harry finally looking back over at a still perplexed Malfoy. “You don’t even know me.”

“No,” Malfoy responds with his brows furrowed, “I don’t suppose I do.”


End file.
